The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

With all due respect to Clint Eastwood and the Spaghetti Westerns I have listed some people and organizations that fall into these three categories.  First, my hat goes off to the Good and I can unreservedly recommend or commend them to you.  Second, the Bad should just go away and leave the rest of us alone.  And finally, the Ugly.   For these I hope, like Clint was want to say, I hope they'll come after me - I want to say "Make my day."  And by the way, these three lists are not based on any scientific survey methodology whatsoever. 

And I have also added what I call the White Hat and the Black Hat Lists at the end of the section.  These two lists cover the the people, organizations and companies which, while not mentioned in the Good, Bad, Ugly area for various reasons, are, I feel, deserving of praise or criticism.  As some of you may be aware, in the 40's I watched far too many Saturday afternoon movies at the South Palo Alto Theater starring Tom Mix, Roy Rogers or The Lone Ranger (and now you know the who, when and where for the term misspent youth).  Anyway, in those days, and as a holdover from the silent flicks of maybe 15-20 years previous, it was 'deriguer' to have the actors wear the right color hat so as to be able to tell the good from the bad guys when they rode into the scene accompanied by a cloud of dust and (imaginary) thundering hoof beats. Hence my two lists.       

  The Good

1. The We Care Pharmacy.    They handle mail order medical supplies and are the most helpful mail order operation I have ever seen.  Along with my first on-line order I also asked them if they stocked an particular item not shown on their web site.  They got back to me a few hours later and said they'd would have it added to their web store by the next day.   Can't do better than that.   Just plain and simple outstanding customer service.
2. The Jacksonville Jaguars.  The team, the players and overall organization are the best role models for young athletes I know of.   As a season ticket holder I have come to know the organization quite well and they just don't come any better than these guys.  But of course the fact that their quarterback, Mark Brunell, helped out Meghan Maxwell greatly when she had cancer and who is also Kathleen's best friend and lives just two doors away, has maybe helped sway my judgement a bit. 
3. The Salvation Army.  Of all the charities I know, the Salvation Army is the tops.  Just ask any Army combat veteran. The Salvation Army could be found helping GI's at the front lines and isolated outposts.  Certain other more well known organizations would of course bring donuts to rear areas and sell them to the GIs along with a cup of coffee for 10¢.   However, I never saw the Salvation Army charged a GI for anything and they were always about a quarter mile closer to the foxholes than the others.   So drop a dollar or two into the red kettle this Christmas and help these really good people out. 
   *   And one of the best ways to help support the Salvation Army is through their Used Car Donation program.  If you have an older car you'll likely find that you'll get more in a tax write-off along with an IRS refund by donating the car to the Salvation Army than you will get by selling it.  E-mail me for details on how the process works; I gave my old Chevy to them earlier this year and it saved a couple of hundred bucks as well as making me feel a lot better. 
4. The US Army Special Forces in Afghanistan for obvious reasons.  Again my judgement maybe considered by some to be biased since I was in that outfit for a few years. And there is an interesting story from Afghanistan on some Special Forces troops here.  Things Haven't changed much over the years.   In 'Nam it was rat and python for meat along with rice, now it is bad goat for meat along with rice.  But the Special Forces medics usually took care of us then as they do now.  And the dress code is similar, black pajamas to blend in the Vietnamese then and Afghan Mujahideen dress today - the more things change the more they stay the same.
5. The TDS Network.  TDS is the best telecom and Internet service provider, especially for DSL, in the country.   Their Tech Support Hotline is the best of any Tech Support operation I have ever experienced in the computer or telecom industry. 
   *   My condolences to those of your who are forced to use AT&T, Earthlink or one of the other mediocre telecoms or ISPs.  I had Earthlink for a little over a year after it brought out Cybergate and my mailbox was constantly full of spam.  Earthlink was raked over the coals by some of the computer and telecommunications journals for its practice of selling of spamming lists facilities to those scum.  When I switched to TDS the spam disappeared.  Now I see Earthlink is trying to market itself as consumer friendly by blocking spam.  Based on its past actions I guess that means Earthlink only allows spam from vendors that brought the spam lists from Earthlink.  And you thought used car salesmen were bad.
   *   And AT&T is the subject of legal action by the Jacksonville City Council for its failure to provide even halfway decent service cable service throughout the city.   It appears the only thing left to be decided is the size of the penalty on AT&T imposed by the city. And if you then decide to switch from Cable to DSL for ISP service you'll probably have to deal either directly or indirectly with Bell South.  they may be marginally better than AT&T but keep a very large supply of aspirin on hand - they'll probably send you a USB DSL modem which doesn't work (but hey, they are cheap to produce and it saves the cost of a Ethernet Network Interface Card) and after about 5 replacements and 15 helpdesk calls they'll tell you go out and buy an Ethernet DSL modem and Ethernet NIC claiming your computer isn't really 'standard' so their advertised offer price and terms do not apply.  One example, we had a whole office full of IT types try  to get one secretary's Bell South DSL modem working over a 6 week period and they never could get the dammed thing to work. 
   *   TDS uses only Ethernet DSL modems (good ones by the way) and they say stick an Ethernet NIC in your computer to start with and then their DSL modem works just fine.   USB DSL modem sellers and old Yugo car salesmen have something in common; I'll leave it to the reader as an exercise to figure out what.  I'd list all the other good things TDS has done for me and does right but it would take up too many pages; you'll just have to trust me on this one.  

  The Bad

1. The vast majority of Politicians.
2. Paul Tagliabue of the NFL.  Can you say Wimp?  He is going to be the downfall of the NFL and do as much damage to Football as the Major League strike did to Baseball a few years ago.  The referees aren't helping matters either.
3. K-Mart. Having gone in and out of Chapter 11 (as well as most of the other chapters in the bankruptcy book) they still don't seem to get it.  They continue to fire anyone over 40, they have had about 10 Chief Information Officers in the past 15 years, and they still think that this or that new, flavor of the month computer system is going to be their salvation.  Every time they get in trouble they try something that is further from they should be doing.   Recollect, when you walked into Wal-Mart who greeted you?  Probably someone like your grandmother.  But when you walked into K-Mart who greeted you?   Probably nobody but there was likely a pimply faced teenager nearby pushing carts around trying to look busy.  I wonder when it will ever occur to K-Mart to put people first?
4. George O'Leary and Geraldo Riviera .  They didn't hang around very long, did they?  They apparently didn't listen to their mother when she said "Always tell the truth."  They are also apparently not believers in the West Point Creed of  "A cadet does not lie, cheat or steal."  And at one time most schools and colleges had similar standards.  Enough said?
5. Manufacturers who don't test their products.   For example, Panasonic makes what appears to be a nice FAX machine at a good price.   Brother also makes a nice one for the same price.  So why does Brother have the lion's share of the market?  Well Panasonic apparently never actually hooked up their FAX machine and gave it a complete, real life test.  If they had done so they would discovered that their FAX machine didn't have a paper catcher (i.e. a simple tray) to catch FAXes that arrived during the night or when the user was doing something besides sitting in front of the machine playing 'catch the sheet'.  I'm not bashing Panasonic, numerous other manufacturers do the same.  Microsoft apparently either forgets, or doesn't know how, to test their software for security.  But then they apparently think they don't have to as their marketing bucks can overcome bugs, blue screens of death, security breaches and severe frustration on the part of many users.       

The brown type face above is intentional.

  The Ugly

1. Osama bin Laden.  Need I say more?
2. ABC Television Network.  They prohibited their broadcasters from wearing an American Flag in their lapels.  The head of ABC said they shouldn't take sides in the War on Terrorism.  Yeah, right.   Like the Taliban allow freedom of the press just like the USA.  ABC broadcasters would be in jail it they tried that stuff in almost any other country outside possibly a few other English speaking ones.  I have started an personal boycott of companies that advertise on ABC's Monday Night Football.  Now I like NFL football but have come to the conclusion that only way to make the TV networks like ABC wake up and smell freedom is to boycott their advertisers and make them suffer the consequences economically; they have no morality, patriotism or sense of justice so you'll be spinning your wheels try to use those qualities.  They can only see the loony left-wing point of view and only visualize dollar bills. So the only thing left is to 'Put em outta business.' 
   *   In case you are interested the term Boycott comes from a Captain Charles Boycott who treated the tennants on his estate in Ireland very badly in late 19th Century.  And more recently in 1955, Mrs. Rosa Parks started the Montgomery Alabama Bus Boycott which ended successfully after the Supreme Court ordered the desegregation of the Montgomery Busses. More details about the word Boycott's origin may be found in encyclopedia.com.  And if memory serves me correctly John Wayne once made a movie set in Ireland which included a Boycott as part of its theme.  To paraphrase the insurance ad, "You're in good hands with a Boycott."  More information on the ABC and similar media bias can be found in a recent excerpt from Yahoo and the New York Post covering the Media Bias Awards for 2001 by clicking here. 
3. The Senate Democrats who are are fiddling while the recession burns.  One could normally ascribe their actions as merely being due to "That's what politicians do" but they have gone too far.   Their disloyalty started with Hilary Clinton and her disparaging looks when President Bush made his speech on terrorism to Congress. Talk about cheap politics - these delays take the cake as well as the cake factory.     
4. John 'bin' Walker.  A firing squad would be too good for him and his ilk.          
5. The City of Berkeley, California for its Anti-American efforts in banning American flags from its fire trucks after 9-11 along with its prohibiting officials from providing any advice to young men on military service while actively providing advice about how to obtain conscience objector status to others.    Again, a boycott of any business doing business in Berkeley seems a wonderful idea at least to me.  You know it is funny how the main way to get the attention of the left wing groups is to hit them in their pockets.  On the other hand patriots, religious folk and others with similar beliefs can be influenced by words like "Duty, Honor, Country".  Now I ask you, who is on the humanitarian side of things?

The putrid yellow type face above is also intentional. 

White Hats

DataViz Company that makes the Documents To Go software for the Handspring PDA for great customer support.

TT Tech Company that makes thumb operated SnapNType minature keyboards for the Handspring PDA for great customer support.

Home Depot for being a handyman's dream palace and also for being a well run company.

Dish Satellite TV Network for their good service.

Black Hats

Both the American and International Red Cross for their sleight of hand tricks with the monies for the 911 fund and their 'concerns' for the poor Taliban captives who used to summarliy execute people during soccer matches in Afghanistan for shaving beards or not wearing enough of the right clothing.

Cable TV services for their lack of service and for not upgrading their cable systems and equipment in years.